Listography: Top 5 Things I'd Like to be Reincarnated As

Hmmm. This is a hard one, Kate Takes 5.

For this month's Listography, the topic is what you'd like to be reincarnated as.

So who, or what, has the loveliest or easiest or most interesting life?


OK, here goes- in no particular order:


1. A lion in a protected game park in Africa.
Lions have an OK life. Top of the food chain; surrounded by family and friends; much of the time spent lazing around in the shade of a tree. I would want to be a FEMALE lion, hanging out and hunting with the other womenfolk; looking after and teaching my cubs, patiently putting up with their gamboling antics (until they get too painful, when they get a quick slap or nip). Most important to avoid the stress and macho crap of being a MALE lion - all that fighting and bluffing to keep your place until a younger upstart throws you out of the pride.


2. A girl, in a secure home with a loving family, 100 years in the future. 
What will things be like for her? What opportunities and experiences will be available to her?
(Obviously, this one needs a conditional out-clause, in case I wake up in a blazing nuclear/terrorist/climate-change Armageddon).


3.  Someone who makes money from creative pursuits, and is successful at that. 
Not a famous person, but someone like, for example, the kind of technical or creative consultants who create things for movies or websites, or a musician who is respected in the industry and works with others better known.


4.  A science writer.
Oh how I envy these people! Great job.


5.  A seagull. 
Oh, I know their lives are actually probably a bit stressful, and involve lots of scrapping for food and looking for food - but watching them soar in the air is one of the best, and most wistful, things in life. Jealous!

What about you? What would YOU like to come back as?

Seagull flying - by Witthaya Phonsawat via FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Seagull - by Dominic Harness via FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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My Dog's Favorite Toys

My dog loves his toys.

His cuddle toy is probably his favorite.

He also likes this one

He loves his daybed

And he loves his winter coat which we put on him at night 

as he sleeps outside. 

He gets very excited when I say "time for bed" and I put on his coat.

In the morning he wriggles himself out of it and then drags it around to lie down with and snuggle.

He likes to gather a few of his toys and sit with them all within reach

He loves his bones too.

He has numerous toys, most of which live in the garden

As do the various bits of plastic he has stolen from inside the house, 

until I collect them and throw them away.

He steals underwear from the laundry hamper and takes it to the garden, where I find it, wet and filthy, days later

Worse than that, he has stolen and destroyed many a rubber sandal, from KMart thongs (that's flip-flops, Americans!) to expensive Crocs and my favorite Ipanemas.   : ((

Worse than THAT, he has caused heartache for the girls, by destroying toys, over and over again

But the toy that gets him MOST excited....

...

...

...

is this one:

a toilet paper roll

And I let him have them because when I give him one, 

the joy and excitement on his face are irresistible.

Even though they very quickly end up like this:

He knows straightaway which items are HIS. 

If I give him a new toy, he is thrilled with it immediately 

and guards it jealously.

He worries when I pick up his toys to toss them outside, 

and gets VERY upset when I put them in the washing machine. 

He is happy and excited when he gets them back, 

and doesn't even mind that they've been cleaned.

He knows what he's not allowed to take (anything that is not his).

He knows when he has done something bad (chewed a child's toy).

But he doesn't stop doing it.

We keep the girls' bedroom doors closed, and shoes in a box.

The girls know they can't leave anything lying around on the floor.

But he still manages to get stuff occasionally.

We have to hide the cat's toys so he won't destroy them.

So the cat only gets to play at night, when the dog is in bed outside.

She harbors resentment, and they have an uneasy relationship.

Somehow, though he's supposedly not allowed on furniture, 

he has managed to make this chair his.

After a hard day's play, a boy does need his rest.

Dogs, eh?

: )

Everyday Beauty: Raindrops

Raindrops on the clothesline:

And on our scraggly young olive tree (olive shrub):

I wanted to add a photo of raindrops on the car window, which I always think looks beautiful, but I couldn't capture it on the camera. Some things you just have to see and enjoy with your eyes, I guess. :)

How to do school lunches

It's the start of a school term, so it's time for magazines and newspaper lifestyle sections to publish articles with ideas for school lunches. Traditionally these articles are accompanied by pretty pastel images of salad wraps tied up with paper and string, and cute snack boxes filled with grated cheese and carrot.  (At least I believe they are, because I stopped opening the links to all these articles quite a long time ago).

Beautiful, healthy and generally very impressive lunchbox,
courtesy of aJ GAZMAN GucciBeaR at Flickr 

When I was a kid my school lunches looked like this:

• wholemeal bread sandwich with margarine, Vegemite and cheese
• 2 homemade biscuits
• apple

Canteen lunch (allowed once a week):

• meat pie
• packet of chips (crisps)

No water bottle was supplied; we drank from the drinking fountains. I'm not saying this was good - drinking-fountain water was warm in summer and could taste metallic, and one of my perpetual memories from childhood is being thirsty and hankering for water in situations where no water was on offer. (I used to wish you could buy a drink of water from a shop - I used to picture it in a soft drink can, and I thought it was one of those useless fantasies that could never really happen, like jet packs and robot dogs).


But I don't remember being overly bored or dissatisfied with lunch. The apples were sometimes bitter, or bruised, or contained unexpected caterpillars (ah, organic food!). No doubt I was sometimes bored or dissatisfied, or jealous of the inevitable kid that came to school with Nutella sandwiches and a giant bag of crisps, but I don't remember it. I always ate all my lunch.


This solid, middle-class, suburban life lunch has definitely influenced what I give my kids for lunch.


Here is what my kids have for lunch, these days:

• a sandwich. A: rice wrap with margarine and Vegemite. M: white bread sandwich with margarine and either jam, honey, cheese or tomato
• a "brain food" snack - usually a cheese stick for A, and cheese and crackers for M. Or sultanas, rice cakes, carrot sticks, etc
• a sweet snack: mini pack of Scooby Doo biscuits, or 2 Coles mini lamingtons, or a muesli bar, or occasionally, 2 homemade biscuits
• fruit: cut up in a little box (as A is put off by whole fruit but will happily eat it cut up): usually a mix of two of apple, orange, mandarin, banana, strawberries and grapes. Or a peeled whole mandarin in a different shaped little box (the transparent square box means cut up fruit. The opaque cylindrical box means possibly a peeled whole mandarin)
• water bottle

Lunch order - they have on Fridays:

• hot food: A: hot dog or nuggets; M: macaroni and cheese, or spag bol, or nachos
• a snack: usually a packet of crisps or a muffin
• a drink: usually Quench or Focus or Just Juice

The teachers definitely encourage "healthy choices" in lunch boxes which is both helpful and annoying. It's mostly helpful, as the kids come home and ask for this stuff, and eat it. Plus I can quote school policy as backup when I tell them they can't have Nutella sandwiches and lollies for lunch.  It's slightly annoying because on the occasional day when the kids don't have the correct 'brain food' in their lunchbox they feel all anxious and ashamed at having the 'wrong' food even when what they have is still perfectly healthy. And also, because my daughter M who has a perfect (lucky) attitude to food, and eats very healthily and well, she should be able to eat a jam sandwich for lunch without me wondering if I'm doing something wrong.


My girls are only in grade 1, so I know it's early days yet, but so far they seem OK with what they get. They have the odd complaint, and their tastes will suddenly change on occasion, which is evidenced by the kinds of comments they give me on their lunch:

"MUM! I TOLD you, I HATE jam now!"
"MUM! I can't EAT Vegemite in a sandwich, it makes me VOMIT!"
"MUM! I HATE flat cheese, I only like GRATED cheese!"
"Ryan gets sprinkles in his sandwiches EVERY DAY."
"Taylor has money for the canteen EVERY DAY."
"Amelia gets a lunch order EVERY DAY."
"I LOVE sultanas. How come you NEVER give us sultanas?"
"I HATE sultanas, don't give them to me EVER, ever again. Ever, Mum, OK?"
 "I didn't like my cheese and crackers and Nicki was hungry so I gave them to her."
"Tomorrow can I have extra cheese and crackers?"
"Ew! Why'd you give me HAM?"
"MUM! My orange was yucky. It was SO GROSS."

And so on.

But overall, lunch is not too tricky, and I feel no need to trawl magazine articles for "lunchbox ideas", cook savory muffins or make up sandwich fillings with cooked chicken, ricotta, grated carrot and walnuts.

As if life isn't hard enough.

What do you do for lunch boxes?

The Things Kids Say...

I don't want to come over all cutesy and all, but here's a collection of some funny things my kids have been saying.

My girls are twins, aged six-and-three-quarters.

A: drawing. Me: "You're really good at drawing, you know that?"
A - still drawing - nods matter of factly. "It's my passion."

___________________________________________

M - eating her macaroni and cheese for dinner:

"Mum, you're the man! This is fantastico!"
... still eating: to A:  "Mum rocks!"
... when I said there was no dessert: "Mum doesn't rock."

___________________________________________

A - whose hero is currently Velma from Scooby Doo:

anytime she's impressed, surprised or dismayed: "Jinkies!"

___________________________________________

M - on seeing a boy in the street who may or may not be from their school:

"That boy looks familiar. There are lots of boys that look like that. Their faces are very bold."

___________________________________________

A came home from school last week and told me "OMG means Oh my God". She has now taken to saying "OMG". I mean actually saying "oh-em-gee".

As in, when I wake her up in the morning: "OMG, I do not want to get up"

___________________________________________

M,  when I asked her to tell me her "secret":

"That's for me to know all about it and for you to not be able to find out."

___________________________________________

A, playing pirates:

"Imagine I'm the captain and you guys are the hearties"

(as in: Aar, me hearties!)

___________________________________________

Then there are also the lame-o catchphrases inherited from moi which are in regular use, making them sound like mini-me Gen Xers:

• No way, Jose!
• Correctamundo!
• What the...?!   
• Mama Mia!    

(I've also tried to teach them "Say it, don't spray it" and "That's my name, don't wear it out", but sadly they haven't stuck).

Fun with kids!

Toffee Apple Fail, Puppet Pass

Toffee Apples.
Challenge accepted.

First batch of toffee - fail.

Second batch of toffee - fail.

Aaaargh!

No toffee apples, kids. Sorry.

 * * *

This turned out better:

M. wanted to make puppets, which we ran out of time for on her last Sunday Fun Day. As chief Good Drawer in residence, A. offered to draw the puppet characters, and we each chose a character and cut it out. M. chose 'The Princess and the Frog.'

Once we cut them out, we used sticky tape to stick them to straws.

The puppet show itself was over in two minutes, and no doubt these will never be played with again. They're pretty cute though.

And that was pretty much our Sunday.

What did you get up to?

Everyday Beauty: Around Here

Just walking around the suburban streets...

Crazy Paving on the path at our local park.

A natural archway formed by trees over a footpath

My neighbors' garden

How's the walking around your place? Anything pretty?

The Santa Dilemma

My kids are in Grade 1, and almost 7 years old. Recently at school, A. spent a lunchtime vigorously defending the reality of Santa because "everyone" was saying that "if you still believe in Santa you're a baby." She sort of looked at me quizzically, but not too quizzically, because she's still very solid on the idea that Santa is real. Mostly her expression was like "Isn't that weird, Mum?" So she wasn't really asking me.

But man, I almost came clean. Almost.


I've been thinking about this for some time. The kids are getting older, and with kids in general being exposed to more and more information younger and younger these days, I don't expect belief in Santa to survive more than another year at best. I've mentioned before that I'm sometimes a bit conflicted about Santa et al. Mostly I love it - I love the wonder and the magic of it, and how our whole culture conspires to provide this magic for children. But sometimes I feel a bit guilty about the deception of it all. Logic tells me I'm not doing anything wrong but my "heart" isn't always convinced.

On the couple of occasions my kids have asked why some kids don't believe in Santa, my mind has automatically thrown up the following possible, but inappropriate, responses: 

"Mate - you still believe in the tooth fairy. You're asking me about Santa?"

"Of course Santa's real, would I lie to you?"

"Dude. Think about it."

So at what age will I tell my kids the truth about Santa?

I'm 43 now - is that a good age?  (boom-tish!)

The Loch Ness Monster and Santa 

I recently read the excellent article 'Loch Ness Memoir' by Tom Bissell in the Virginia Quarterly Review, in which the author recounts a trip to Loch Ness and remembers his childhood belief in the monster.

He is clearly my own generation. My heart jumped as he mentioned the 'generation-defining television show In Search Of...' which 'managed to sound both skeptically sober and insanely irresponsible' and which 'suited the mood of that blurry, nameless time (1979-1981)...' 

Yes! Way to capture a moment - and my childhood. I LOVED 'In Search Of...' (and I have the book from the series).  Like 'all children' I too loved 'dinosaurs and the paranormal', and yes, I'll agree that that era seemed well suited to those passions. Bookstores abounded with stuff on 'unexplained phenomena', and my pocket money was regularly spent on books on ESP, astral projection, dreams, cryptozoology and UFOs. I am sure I am not mis-remembering when I think that there was less knowledge and therefore less skepticism in those days. More sober and intelligent people were open to the possibility of 'unexplained phenomena', because we did not have the knowledge of the human genome, the brain and the nervous system, nor the public and devastating debunkings of Uri Geller and psychics in general that were to come later.   


Tom Bissell posits that the Loch Ness Monster is enduring and is loved because it is friendly, or at least benign, and it combines those two childhood interests, 'dinosaurs and the paranormal' . To his childhood self, 'The Loch Ness Monster made the world a little stranger, a little more wonderful.'



Do you remember the day you stopped believing in things you believed in as a child? I do. I remember the day my mother answered my question "Santa's not real, is he?" with "No," and a smile. I was shocked. And upset. I really expected her to say yes!  But, you know - I was nine. It was definitely time.


I remember believing in the Loch Ness Monster until I was a teenager, and then reading in a Sunday paper a feature article that included the fact that Loch Ness was only formed 10,000 years ago during the last Ice Age. Pleisiosaurs, of course, died out with the other dinosaurs 60 million years ago. So that settled it. Oh well then, that's that, I thought, surprised. I was a little deflated, a little sad... but mostly surprised. The loch is only 10,000 years old. That's a very important fact. That's the salient fact. How had I not read of this before, in all the years of all the print on the Loch Ness Monster I had devoured?  

How strange, I thought. Why is there even a debate about this? The thing simply cannot exist. It was my first realization that people could write books that were skewed to leave out certain inconvenient facts. 



Tom Bissell compares this to the realisation that Santa does not exist:

I finally remember, for the first time in a long time, the day in third grade when, during recess, Chris Burkland announced that Santa Claus did not exist. His brother had told him so. I stepped forward, rationally explaining how the man had been eating the cookies and drinking the milk I left out for him for years now. Chris Burkland would not back down. Neither would I. It came to blows. When my teacher learned of the cause of our fight she visibly blanched. Even though it was the middle of the day, my father was called. I was still crying when he picked me up, still infuriated. On that short, very long ride home, something about my father’s silence kept me from asking the question I suddenly knew the answer to. And how strange that was. The people I loved most, the entire culture I lived in, had systematically set out to deceive me, and I had no idea why. The confusing, unfamiliar way in which this hurt, my desire to believe in something that part of me always knew was not real and could not be real—I remember it so clearly.

BAM. There's the kicker. That sense of betrayal, and the confusion and hurt around that betrayal. I hate the thought of causing that.

But kids get over it, right? I don't think I felt that hurt/confusion for more than a few minutes, and I don't think I felt bad about it for long. 

But it was as if suddenly the world was very different. It's a strange feeling, to suddenly realize the world is not what you thought it was. When I was 13 I knew I didn't really believe in God any more. When I was older than that, I reluctantly put away my beloved beliefs in UFOs, out-of-body experiences, ESP, telepathy and divining the future. If anything I think the paranormal stuff hit me harder than Santa or God, but in each case the feeling was the same. The world was different. It was clearer, it was suddenly dazzling and new. But it was also just a little less wonderful... for awhile. 

Everyday Beauty: Weeds

I hate weeds. They're usually ugly. They stop pretty ground cover and flowers from flourishing. And they're what makes me give up gardening, time and time again.

But even among the weeds, there is beauty.

I quite like this stuff:

Clover and "buttercups". Gorgeous.

This one had to be taken as an EXTREME close-up, because this is one of those ugly, sprawling, prickly fellas (who has since been pulled out). 

But the flower was rather stunning, when you looked up close:

Where did you see everyday beauty this week?

Work and Walk: NAILED IT

If you're like me and work in an office environment, in the city, work clothes can be a hassle. Unless you're very senior or in a very staid industry, you probably don't have to manage pantyhose (shudder), high heels, suits or full make-up, but you still need to look a bit corporate and moderately well groomed.

At the same time you probably catch public transport, which means walking a little, which means you also need to be comfortable.

In my head I have a hazy sort of ideal outfit that I call "Good To Go". The Good To Go outfit is dark trousers, a mid-season top, cross-body satchel bag and low-heeled boots or shoes. Possibly an artfully-knotted scarf or non-bulky jacket on top. It's something you can wear almost anywhere, and it is comfortable and hassle-free.  It's the kind of outfit worn by girls-on-the-run in spy movies, or hot lady cops in the better TV mini-series.  It doesn't have to be plain - it can be a sparkly top, or satiny pants - but the main requirements of Good To Go are that the outfit is streamlined, simple, stylish and walkable.

Unfortunately, though this outfit is my daily goal, I rarely come close to achieving it, due to limitations imposed by money (style is expensive) and body shape. Most days I settle for a pair of nice-looking black pants that are not too short (hard - very hard to find), a longish top and a soft jacket or cardigan. Oh, and the artfully knotted scarf.

I have three good quality bags, one of which is a cross-body satchel (though too small for everyday work use really), and the other two which are great-looking and were expensive but are not ideal designs for carrying. One is a good shape but too heavy, the other can only be looped over a wrist or carried by the handles, which gets annoying.

Shoes are tricky. In my youth I never found shoes hard. I wore what I liked and I walked everywhere. In the 80s I was a student and wore Doc Martens, brogues or flats. In the nineties I was living in Greece where appearance is everything, baby - this was my stylish phase, and I wore high-heeled ankle boots or very high platform heels, along with short skirts, slim dresses, leggings, fitted jackets and other gorgeous stuff I can no longer go near.

I never remember shoes being too uncomfortable back then. Heels were a bit, of course - but certainly not everyday flat shoes.

These days? It's IMPOSSIBLE for me to find a comfortable shoe. I think once you're past 40 no shoe is going to be totally comfortable, unless it's a runner. I'm also quite a bit heavier than I was in my youth, and I know that has an impact. But more than that, with age comes wisdom or perhaps grumpiness, and I have close to zero tolerance for sartorial discomfort as a result.

Since my accident and surgery I've been wearing casual pants and runners pretty much non-stop - that's almost 4 months - and that's been very comfortable, but I'm pretty sick of them.

This week I returned to the office for the first time in weeks, having worked mostly at home since we came back from Greece. Since I can't drive, I have had to abandon the car commute I was so fond of and return to public transport. Which I am quite enjoying, to be honest, though not loving the hour and a half the trip takes me most days.

But I am finding it seriously challenging to put work outfits together, which are also comfortable for my "walking bouts" in between buses and trains and the office.


Here's the thing:

• I'm sick of wearing runners to work and carrying an extra bag for my work shoes.
• I want to wear nice shoes which are also comfortable, and I don't want to break a sweat on my morning commute.
• I want to carry ONE bag. And I don't always want that to be a giant tote or a backpack.

Another thing - and I blame my kids for this because it didn't happen before them - is that I find it very difficult to leave and arrive home carrying ONE bag. Even if I leave with one bag (e.g. having left my work shoes at the office so no need to tote them), I arrive home with two or three, by the time I've picked up emergency groceries, a schnitzel and veggies from a cafe to serve for dinner, or some, um, magazines and books (but I've cut that out now, really).

(The last 2 days I've had to stop at the quickie-mart on the way home, to pick up margarine, hair clips, lunch box snacks and the like which my organised self neglected to order from the supermarket).


Soooo.... you appreciate how difficult and unwieldy my life is, I hope.


Except today - thanks to a fortuitous combination of circumstances, I managed to achieve Good To Go.


The circumstances:

• warm and mild weather. My favourite weather in Melbourne today: warm but not hot, mildy sunny and blowy. Perfect. No sweating, no freezing, no lugging around an umbrella or a coat
• second day back at the office. This meant I had already lugged in my extra bag with notebooks and files from home the previous day, so I only needed one bag

The outfit:

• slim straight black pants
• long silky top with elbow-length sleeves
• long, black sleeveless jackety thing (dressy, slimming, adds coverage and a little warmth)
• taupe patent platform sandals - comfortable to walk in 
• moderately-sized, non-heavy bag which loops comfortably over arm or shoulder, leaving other hand free for Myki card, phone or coffee cup. 

(I 'shopped my closet' and rediscovered a lovely bag which was not expensive but looks it, and which being mostly fabric is light to carry, while still being roomy [and bonus, the lining is pale caramel, making it easy to find stuff inside]).

I was going in a little late to the office after we dropped the kids at their holiday program, so Y. dropped me at the train station near his work, which is in a MUCH nicer area than where we live. There is a cafe across from the station so while I waited for my train I picked up a takeaway coffee and in my perfect outfit and large sunglasses I swanned stylishly down the street imagining I lived there and that every day I sauntered thusly across the road from my renovated Edwardian house to the train station.  I passed a boutique home furnishing shop which advertised 'Hours: 9.30 - 3.00', and I thought, Well, wouldn't that be nice.

I felt mobile, powerful, stylish and comfortable. I was Good To Go.

Now... what am I going to wear tomorrow?

Image by adamr courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net